


The Invention of 008

by NoAffiliation



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), Kingsman (Movies)
Genre: BAMF!Eggsy, Eggsy is a Double O, Harry Hart Lives, Harry Hart is a douchebag, M/M, but in a recoverable way, but not for MI6, everyone is a total asshole for no reason, there's a high governing board in Kingsman
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-26
Packaged: 2018-10-09 02:22:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10401597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoAffiliation/pseuds/NoAffiliation
Summary: After saving the world, Eggsy is left without a code name. In fact he doesn't even have a place at the round table.  Luckily there's another spy agency with a rash of vacancies.Or the one where the Kingsman don't want Eggsy, but MI6 does.





	1. Eggsy's life is hard

“I’m sorry, Eggsy,” Merlin says and actually sounds it. “There’s no position for you in Kingsman. You understand.”

Eggsy understands, of course. He understands just fine.

He’s unwanted here, even after everything he’s done. With his breeding and his past he ain’t useful like Roxy, ain’t wanted like the remaining knights. He’s used to being this: alone, without a place, looked down upon.

So, yeah, he understands.

People like him? They don’t get happy endings.

\---------------------------------------------------

The world in the wake of Valentine is, in a word, fucked. The Kingsman and other intelligence agencies are scrambling to find agents, oust traitors, locate those prominent people with too much integrity to cave to the demands of a mad man.

Eggsy wants to take Daisy and his mum, secret them away, barricade the door. But even in this new, harsher world things cost money and they need a shelter where Daisy can feel safe. 

And Daisy. Christ, Daisy is getting so big now and she’ll be in school soon, if the school is up and running by then. She needs clothes and supplies and  _ food _ , all these things that his mum is  _ incapable _ of getting for her daughter.

Eggsy is all Daisy has and he needs to  _ do better _ ,  _ be  _ better.

He also, he knows, needs to take care of Dean before things get worse.

So Eggsy walks home after saving the word, not a taxi in sight that will take him with the blood running from his head, suit or no. He walks to the little apartment that’s in Dean’s name.

He’s gotten a call from his mum, saying everything was fine, but there’s a part of him that doesn’t believe her, will never believe her. There’ve been too many nights going hungry, left in Dean’s care, locked out in the cold for him to  _ ever  _ believe her.

By the time the apartment comes into view, he’s full on sprinting past the rubble and blood and wreckage littering the streets.

He bursts into the place like he’s expecting to fight (he is), chest heaving, his wounds and bruises throbbing in time with his racing heart. His mum blinks at him from the couch, Daisy cradled in her lap.

“Eggsy,” she says, breathless. “You came back.”

It’s wrong and cruel, but Eggsy doesn’t have the strength for the niceties he normally manages. He’ll take care of his mum, always, but he’s only passingly relieved to see her unharmed. Instead, his eyes are trained on the toddler on her lap.

Daisy looks at him with large, trusting eyes and her little mouth breaks into a smile around the fingers she’s got in it. “E’gy.”

“Daisy,” he says. He’s in front of them before he realizes he’s taken the steps and he lifts the little girl from their mother’s unresisting arms. He holds her to his chest, buries his nose in her fine, soft hair and just  _ breathes _ .

She’s so small and she could have been killed and, after everything, he can’t believe that there can still be something so good in the world.

Especially when the world has already lost so much. Kings and Queens and  _ good  _ people. People like Harry whose death still burns in Eggsy’s heart.

It hurts worse to know that there’s still  _ bad  _ people in the world too.

“Where’s Dean, Mum?” Eggsy asks. He sets Daisy down in her play area and stays crouched next to the gate. He looks back around at his mother who looks a right mess.

“Why?” she asks, cagey. Her arms come up around herself and, in the movement, Eggsy can see new track marks in the crooks of her elbows.

He goes cold and tired all at once.

He wants to ask what she was thinking, shooting up after Valentine. He wants to ask why she’d do that to Daisy after seeing how it fucked Eggsy up. He wants to ask if she takes  _ anything  _ serious enough to not search for the peace drugs bring her.

Eggsy doesn’t ask any of these things and he doesn’t answer why he wants to see the man who’s hurt him over and over again.

“I’m not going to ask again, Mum,” Eggsy says quietly. He knows that something’s broken in him, loose and feral, and he lets her see that in his eyes. He will never hurt her,  _ can’t  _ hurt her, but he’s done relying on her, on anyone, to take care of what’s his. Daisy is his in a way he can’t begin to explain and he knows that Dean hurts even her.

His mum pales, her hands clenching around her elbows. “The Black Prince.”

That’s all Eggsy needs to hear.

\------------------------------------------------------------

He doesn’t have anything to give to Daisy. The Kingsmen hadn’t wanted him, hadn’t given him anything, so, in turn, he’s come empty handed with the burning desire to finally make things  _ right _ .

He hasn’t got a house, a home, to give her, so he must procure one. The apartment is in Dean’s name, and Dean is a threat to Daisy, in one way or another. It’s all very simple to Eggsy now, after being responsible for murdering hundreds of people to keep more safe.

Dean can’t be allowed to come back to the apartment and he can’t be allowed to see Daisy  _ ever again _ .

He shucks off his suit, folds the glasses and hides them in the folds. The ring he slips into a pocket and he bundles the entire thing in an old tshirt from the army. He’s not a Kingsman, will never be one, and he won’t wear the uniform any longer. It’s better to do the things he’s about to do in his own clothes, a sort of declaration of what he’s become.

Still, he tapes the bundle under his bed with care, disguises it so it’s not easily found. It’s a symbol of all the things he’s wanted to be and it seems fitting that it will remain in the dark, hidden, away from the light.

Instead he puts on the armor he used to wear before Harry Hart thought he could be something better. Jeans ratty from wear, a cap hiding the bruises on his head, a black hoodie, black trainers. The clothes of a rough sort and not an agent of Kingsman.

They’re a little tighter than he remembers, the bulk of muscle from training straining against the shirt around the shoulders and chest.

Eggsy leaves Daisy with his mum, half afraid of what will happen while he’s gone. But Michelle seems to be coming out of her high and, provided she doesn’t shoot more, can watch Daisy for a few hours, maybe even feed her.

Still, he feels the need to hurry.

The Black Prince is a little worse for wear, the wood that makes up its storefront is scarred and charred from the fighting that’s broken out. There’s a body in the trash out back, a victim of the massacre that nobody has missed or bothered to honor.

Eggsy pushes the doors open like he owns the place.

It’s clean inside, the bartender obviously hopeful that business will resume shortly. A few of the chairs are broken and piled in a corner, their corresponding tables naked without them. The bartender is conspicuously absent, as he always is with this crowd about. Dean, Rottie, and the others are all piled in one of the untouched booths, looking mean and unhappy over half-finished pints.

Dean spots him first. “Mugsy’s back then. Finally come to have that word with me?”

Eggsy turns and locks the door behind him. He’s absurdly reminded of how  _ Harry  _ had once turned and locked these door before kicking these chavs’ arses.  _ Manners maketh man _ , Harry had said. Eggsy feels the words on the tip of his tongue but he doesn’t say them.

He’s unworthy of Harry’s legacy and he certainly doesn’t have any manners to speak of. He’s a scrap, a rent boy, a  _ whore _ and he’s not better than his former self. He’s  _ worse _ because he’s got the tools the old him could only  _ dream  _ of and he’s about to use them.

So, no, he’s not a man.

When he turns, he lets Dean see the  _ beast  _ on his face.

“No,” the thing that is Eggsy says. “I ain’t come to have a word.”

He doesn’t wait for Dean to say anything else. He doesn’t wait for the others to get up. Instead, Eggsy puts his chin down and  _ moves _ .

\--------------------------------------------------------------

After, he’s covered in blood and he knows he won’t get away with this. He’s killed six people and even with the police in shambles, eventually someone will come asking. Maybe they’ll blame it on V-day, maybe they’ll blame it on looters, maybe they’ll ask his mum who will tell them everything. Eventually, they’ll come for him.

Until then, he’s got some time.

He breaks into a department store, still closed after V-day, and steals new clothes. Then he goes and pays Jamal and Ryan a visit.

They’re relieved to see him and something under the ice feels warm at their concern. They’re the best sort of mates, really, and Eggsy is sorry he can’t be better for them too.

Their apartment’s been trashed in the violence, both of them are covered in wounds, and they’re stunned when Eggsy asks them to move into what is now his mum’s apartment. 

Jamal and Ryan owe him but not nearly as much as he owed them when they agree to watch over Daisy, to make sure she gets on the right track no matter what happens to Eggsy.

\-------------------------------------------------------------

They get him when he leaves the wreckage of their flat.

Eggsy fights because that’s what he  _ does _ . He fights like a wild thing, bloody fists and bared teeth, and three go down before one manages to  _ shoot him in the leg _ .

Unfortunately for them, that just makes Eggsy angrier. Because even though he’s set something up for Daisy, he wants to be there for her. He wants to be there.

He takes another three down before the blood loss slows him enough for one of the last few gets him in the neck with a needle.

It’s not long until his vision greys out and he drops, consciousness fading fast and hard.

\--------------------------------------------------------------

He wakes up tied to a chair in the middle of a grey, concrete room. A table is directly to his left, a sheet covering whatever’s on it, and one of those old TVs on a stand he’d seen in secondary.  There’s a bare, flickering bulb above him that’s so typical that he grins down at his lap, head still too heavy from the drugs to lift.

“You’re awake,” a smooth, male voice says. Eggsy finds the strength to lift his head. The man is tall, late thirties, with blonde hair and ice blue eyes. He’s wearing a casual suit and he looks for all the world like he’s beside a pool rather than what Eggsy assumes is the basement of some notorious crime syndicate.

“Well spotted,” Eggsy says. His words slur and he frowns. What’d they given him? Horse tranquilizers? He twists his wrists against the rope binding them behind the chair. There’s no give; they’re expertly tied.

“My...employer,” the man says, tasting the word, “has some questions regarding the demise of a man named Valentine.”

Jesus, he’d expected the police, not  _ this.  _ “Don’t know ‘im.”

The man quirks an eyebrow. He removes a hand from his pocket to turn on the TV, then settles against the wall, eyes never leaving Eggsy.

The TV shows static and, slowly, begins to clear. On it, there’s a very familiar set of stone hallways. After a moment, a figure comes sliding around the corner, running up a wall before sprinting dead down the hall. Behind the man, a horde of soldiers in white appear, shooting.

Eggsy feels a chill go down his spine as he realizes it’s  _ him _ . It’s him in Valentine’s lair and it’s him killing Valentine’s men.

“I find it hard to believe,” the man says, his voice cultured like Harry’s, “that you don’t know Valentine considering you were his...uninvited guest a few days ago.”

Eggsy swallows. “That could be anybody.”

The man seems amused, his icy eyes flicking to the side. There’s a camera there and Eggsy frowns. Who was watching this?

“We know that you were there,” the man says. “We know that you and several unknown persons are responsible for stopping Valentine’s plans. We know that you work for an organization, a very secretive organization.” His relaxed air abruptly disappears and he’s a hundred times more dangerous than Eggsy first thought. This man is a killer, a predator, and his eyes are cold as they settle on  _ Eggsy _ . “I want you to tell me about it.”

Eggsy stares at him, jaw tight. He knows now that he won’t be getting out of this, will never be seeing Daisy again. Because even if the Kingsman didn’t want him, Eggsy isn’t a snitch. They’d given him  _ something  _  and he won’t disrespect Harry, even now, by selling them out.

“I would, bruv,” he drawls, face as cold as the man’s eyes. “‘Cept gutter trash like me don’t know much of anything.”

Although it doesn’t show on his face, the man seems pleased. “We’ll see, Mr. Unwin. We’ll see.” He flicks the sheet off the table, revealing an assortment of knives and hooks and,  _ jesus _ , pliers.

“Call me Eggsy,” Eggsy says and grins with too many teeth.


	2. A Rapid Succession

Eggsy knows pain. He knows about being shot, he knows about being beaten, he knows about being raped.

He’s used to pain but he’s never known pain like this. He’s never been so methodically, so  _ deliberately _ tortured. The wounds the man inflicts on him are small, inconsequential to the point that they might not even scar given the right treatment. 

It somehow adds to the torture, knowing that the end is a long,  _ long  _ way off if it’s even coming at all. This man, Eggsy suspects, might be able to keep him alive for  _ years _ given the inclination.

Not to mention what this man  _ knows _ .

Eggsy hasn’t talked, hasn’t uttered a word beyond denials and cut off screams. Yet the man has detailed what happened at Valentine’s lair, how Eggsy got there, how Eggsy left. He’s revealed that he knows the Kingsman’s name, even knows the name of the old Arthur.

He  _ knows  _ so much and Eggsy refuses to agree, to give in.

Until the man brings up Daisy.

The man’s eyes sharpen when Eggsy twitches. “Your little sister is going to be quite the beauty someday. Provided she grows up. In these troubled times, who knows what might happen to a child out alone, a druggie for a mother and a criminal for a brother?”

Eggsy is faced with an impossible choice and it makes his vision go red. He can’t,  _ won’t,  _ sell out the Kingsman but it’s  _ Daisy _ . If he tells this  _ bastard  _ about the Kingsman it’ll be over. Daisy will (maybe) be safe.

But Kingsman belongs to Harry. Kingsman is  _ essential _ , have proven over and over how essential they are to the safety of the world. Without them, without them  _ using  _ Eggsy, Daisy would have been killed in V-day.

If he tells, she might not be safe anyway.

For the first time in what feels like  _ hours _ , Eggsy speaks.

“You know an awful lot,” he tells the man. He clips his syllables, makes his voice hard like Harry had taught him. He’s vibrating with rage, his hands curling into fists despite having lost feeling in them sometime between the bamboo shoots under his nails and the thumb screws. “Been following me? Been tracking me?”

“Certain people have, yes,” the man says. He watches Eggsy like he’s not sure what he’s saying, on edge and tense.

Eggsy smiles, too many teeth bare to be anything but  _ menacing _ . “Then you know what I did today.”

The man’s face gives nothing away. “What did you do today?”

“I killed six men,” Eggsy says. He feels cold and very removed from everything. He idly marks all the ways he can kill this man. It’ll take some doing but he’s not afraid of breaking his body if it means this man  _ dies _ before he  _ ever  _ touches a hair on Daisy’s head. “I did it slowly. First I broke their arms. Then their knees. After that I bashed each of their heads in until I could see their brains spreading across the floor. Do you know why I did it?”

The man’s lips barely move. “No.”

Eggsy’s eyes are filled with fire and he leans forward, straining his shoulders. “Because they were a threat to my sister, just like you are. And I  _ promise  _ you, what I did to them will look like  _ mercy  _ compared to what will happen to you if you  _ fucking  _ go near her. So,  _ no,  _ I don’t fucking know anything.”

The man is silent. He’s observing Eggsy, giving nothing away. It occurs to Eggsy that this man is completely blank, has  _ always  _ been completely blank and has only allowed Eggsy to see what he  _ wants  _ to see.

It occurs to him that he doesn’t care because he is  _ equally  _ as dangerous as this man, more feral and vicious than can possibly be imagined.

“I don’t think I’ve introduced myself,” the man says. He grins and it’s sharklike. “Bond. James Bond.” He leans forward. “I work for MI6.”

\--------------------------------------------------------------

Eggsy isn’t sure what his luck is. He’d been turned away from Kingsman with nothing but the shirt on his back only to be picked up by MI6, given a salary bigger than anything he’s ever  _ dreamed  _ of, and a  _ codename _ .

Kingsman had never given Eggsy a codename.

They ask him about his previous organization. They ask for details and names but Eggsy keeps denying any knowledge of it. They don’t really seem to mind.

“We don’t have time to train new agents,” M tells him. He’s a stern looking man and his arm is in a sling. According to the rumors, he’s fended off two, highly trained agents during Valentine’s massacre and gotten his elbow broken for the trouble. “We’ve had a harder time than most after V-day. Our double o section was almost annihilated.”

“That probably happens when you have a room filled with some of the deadliest people in England,” Eggsy says. He’s been snooping around their headquarters while his wounds heal and finds that their tech department is almost criminally chatty, despite their terrifying quartermaster whom Eggsy has yet to meet.

M frowns. “Yes, well, imagine our surprise when we find out that the man who killed Valentine is not only a citizen but an  _ unaffiliated  _ citizen at that with the training we need.”

“You can’t be picky,” Eggsy says. He thinks they’d never have picked him up unless they were desperate.

“No, we can’t,” M says and his eyebrow is arched high like he doesn’t quite know what to make of Eggsy. He slides a manila folder across the table to Eggsy. “Welcome to MI6, 008. Here’s your first mission.”

\------------------------------

The first time Eggsy meets Q, he’s fresh from his pre-mission physical and thinking longingly of a shower. But he’s got a plane ticket that tells him he’s leaving in an hour and his unofficial mentor, 007, breathing down his neck.

“I’ll introduce you,” Bond says, all easy grace and earnest charm. “My pleasure, really.”

From some of the rumors flying around the tech department, Eggsy doesn’t doubt that in the slightest. He feels a little sorry for this quartermaster for attracting the attention of the likes of Bond.

He finds out rather quickly that he should have saved his pity for someone who actually needed it.

Q is a typhoon trapped behind large, obnoxious glasses similar to those worn by Kingsman. He’s calm and efficient and young but Eggsy has seen enough of the world to know all that can still sum up to  _ deadly _ .

He minds his p’s and q’s, says sir after each question and stays silent when Q is talking. Behind the thin quartermaster is a veritable wall of technology that Eggsy doesn’t understand and doesn’t want to face.

“How are you doing this?” Bond asks Q incredulously. “He’s never addressed me as ‘sir.’”

“His address seems appropriate to my position,” Q says.

“Fuck off,” Eggsy tells Bond. “You don’t do shit to deserve it.”

“You’re acting like you’re more afraid of him than me,” Bond claims. He looks faintly petulant. Eggsy can see why. Most people at MI6 are almost instinctually scared of Bond. After finding some old, paper records, Eggsy can see why.

Eggsy scowls at Bond and looks back to Q, masking the expression. “Please continue, sir.”

“You  _ are  _ more afraid of him,” Bond says, wondering. A spasm of irritation flits across his face. “Good god,  _ why? _ ”

“Oh for god’s sake,” Q says. “He’s not--”

“I am,” Eggsy says because Bond is being ridiculous. Q’s face goes blank and Eggsy thinks it’s a bit like gaping for the other man. Eggsy shrugs. “Ain’t no shame in fear.”

“Have I done something to earn your distrust?” Q asks. 

Eggsy blinks. “I trust you, bruv. You’re the quartermaster.”

“Then why?” Bond asks again. Eggsy hasn’t missed how Bond’s scowled at Q’s pleased expression when Eggsy called him the quartermaster. If he’s not careful, he could be facing Bond’s jealousy. He’s afraid of that too.

“Two months ago a man caused nearly 800 million people to die,” Eggsy says. He looks at Bond like he’s crazy because, as far as Eggsy is concerned, he is. “He did it through a computer chip.”

“But you aren’t afraid of  _ him _ ,” Bond says.

“He’s dead, ain’t he?” Eggsy asks. He keeps his face blank. 

Q is sitting back, watching them with an inscrutable expression on his face. “You killed Valentine, 008. I hardly think I pose more of a challenge than him.”

Bond tenses at the insinuation that Eggsy will take out Q.

“Allegedly,” Eggsy says easily, sending a charming smile to the quartermaster. Being around Bond, Q probably doesn’t find it that charming. “And it ain’t the same is it?”

“How so?” Q asks as if he hasn’t preemptively activated Bond.

“You’re a lot smarter than Valentine,” Eggsy says. He doesn’t say that Q is working for the government. He knows first hand that that’s not a reason to trust someone either. “And your guard dog is a lot scarier. It, allegedly, took me two minutes to get to Valentine. By then 800 million had died. How long do you think it’d take me to get through Bond?”

“You wouldn’t,” Q says blandly. There’s a spark in his eye and a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

“Damn right he wouldn’t,” Bond says and blessedly settles down.

Eggsy shrugs, not wanting to debate that. They’re probably right. Bond gives off the same vibe he’d gotten from Harry and he doesn’t want to ever risk it. He says, “I wouldn’t call it fear. Might be closer to paranoia. Either way, you won’t get lip from me, sir.”

“Oh, stop it,” Q says. “We’re practically the same age. Call me Q.”

Eggsy doesn’t mention that he’s nearly a decade younger than Q. Instead he smiles and says, “Q it is. You can call me Eggsy.”

\-------------------------------------------------------------

After their somewhat rocky beginning, Q and Eggsy get along like a house on fire, much to Bond’s consternation. They work well together on missions, Eggsy following Q’s directions nearly unquestioningly. The man’s good at what he does. So is Eggsy, but Eggsy isn’t under any illusions. He may have taken out Valentine but he’s still new and wet behind the ears.

“Be more like 008,” Q tells Bond in medical. Bond’s gotten shot again trying to go left instead of right and Q is justified in his anger, as far as Eggsy is concerned.

Still, Eggsy, leaning by the door, winces. That was ill said and he can’t imagine Bond will take it well.

In a twist that surprises nobody, Bond doesn’t take it well at all. Q storms from the infirmary, fuming, and leaves an equally infuriated 007 for Eggsy to deal with.

“Are you fucking him?” Bond asks. His glacial eyes are alight with fury and Eggsy knows he’s in a very dangerous situation. Bond is a monster, even with a bullet through his leg, and there’s a very real possibility that he can kill Eggsy even so injured.

Eggsy knows when to be afraid but that doesn’t mean he has to act like it.

He relaxes his body, sliding his hands into the pockets of his suit pants, and tosses an easy grin towards Bond. Bond’s eyes narrow at the posture, picking apart and dissecting each move like the professional he is.

“Well?” Bond asks, coiling like a snake ready to strike.

“To be honest,” Eggsy says, “I’d rather fuck you than him.” He gives Bond his filthiest leer, something he learned on the streets, and looks him up and down from toe to head.

Bond blinks and, to Eggsy’s delight, colors nearly imperceptibly. “I’m… flattered.” The tension is draining from him but a different sort of wariness is rising. “You realize that it would be a terrible idea.”

Eggsy snorts at the understatement. “I said ‘rather’, bruv, not ‘want to.’ I ain’t in the market for a boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend,” Bond says flatly. He examines Eggsy like he hasn’t seen him before. “You don’t strike me as a relationship sort of man.”

That actually stings because Eggsy  _ knows  _ that. He’s not the sort of man someone takes home for more than a night or two and he knows it. His mouth twists bitterly and he says, “I don’t want to strike you in any sort of way so that’s fine.”

“But there was someone you wanted to strike,” Bond deduces easily. His eyebrows go up at the expression on Eggsy’s face. “Someone you  _ still  _ want to make your boyfriend. Who?”

Eggsy lets his face shut down, too tired to make the effort to emote. “We all got dead people, bruv.”

“Ah,” Bond says. He pauses, awkward. “If you’d ever like to talk…”

_ No. _

Eggsy lets his face reactivate, another mask sliding into place. “I’d rather talk about  _ you _ . You want to fuck the quartermaster?” He grins, wide and unholy. “Tell me  _ all about it _ .”

Bond looks like he’d rather face the gallows. Again.


End file.
